Is food shortage expected?

Baku/09.09.22/Turan: There is a serious rise in prices in the world and food shortages are becoming a real threat, said Goshgar Tahmezli, chairman of the Food Safety Agency, at the event "Innovations in Plant Health for Food Safety" held on September 5. It is worth noting that the world food price index has been falling  over  for the fifth month. According to the  Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), in August the world food price index decreased by 1.9% compared to July and amounted to 138 points. World food prices have been declining for the last 5 months. However, the impact of this process on retail markets is not felt. What is the reason?

Vahid Maharramli, an expert on agrarian issues, answers these and other questions in the "Difficult Question" program.

According to him, Goshgar Tahmezli touched upon a topic to which he has nothing to do. “There are plenty of competent organizations in the world that are engaged in forecasting the situation on the food market. Goshgar Tahmezli deals with the problem of food safety and it would be great if he commented on the situation in this area. There are a lot of low-quality food products in the country, which are sold at high prices,” the expert said.

Referring to the threat of shortage of food products on the world market, Maharramli noted that modern technologies make it possible to produce more food than now. “But this is done not for an excessive increase in food production  that can cause serious damage to farmers. Abundance can seriously lower prices and therefore almost all countries regulate the production of agricultural products,” Maharramli explained.

In his opinion, if there is no a Russian-Ukrainian war, then there would have been no problems with grain and vegetable oil. There was a problem with logistics, transportation, supplies. But this problem was solved and there was no food shortage.

“Ukraine can already deliver its products to the world grain market. This has led to a slight decline in prices lately,” Maharramli said, adding that the forecast for grain production indicates that food prices will gradually decrease.

“According to the FAO report for August, it is clear that over the past 5 months, food prices have been declining, and in August there was a serious decline in grain prices. In particular, the price of wheat fell by more than 5%. Reduced Prices for meat, milk, sugar also reduced. There is no such problem in the world. FAO in its report indicates that in Canada, the USA, Russia and a number of other countries there is a serious increase in grain production,” the expert clarified. –0—